Magdalene girl: ‘I cried for weeks and weeks. I was nobody. I was 16’

CLAIMING that the new “information wasn’t available” when he rejected a distinct redress scheme for Magdalene survivors, Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe’s response rings hollow (Irish Examiner, December 17). It is important, moreover, to emphasise that evidence of state complicity rests not only with the materials laid before the Department of Justice on December 14.

Indeed, the Department of Education must also acknowledge its own complicity in this matter.

Had officials from the department attended the scheduled meeting with Justice for Magdalenes (JFM), I would have pointed to the department’s awareness of children being placed in Magdalene laundries as late as 1970 (beyond those transferred from state residential institutions).